Jonathan Levine Quotes

I'm always walking around with headphones on, creating my own soundtracks to whatever the day is. I think I have a poppy sensibility.

- Jonathan Levine

Zombies have always had a lot of built-in social commentary.

- Jonathan Levine

I really like using genre to tell a story about characters but also use it as a Trojan horse to tell social or cultural commentary. That's where the best stuff, especially in the zombie genre, comes out of.

- Jonathan Levine

I feel like comedy is where I'm most at ease, but I also have an allergy to silly jokes.

- Jonathan Levine

I don't like being pigeonholed at all. It stemmed from after 'Mandy Lane': I was being offered all these horror movies. I love horror movies, but when I dreamed of being a director, it was always doing all sorts of things.

- Jonathan Levine

There are things that I can tell my friends that I just can't tell my family, just as far as how I'm feeling about things. My friends know me the best in a certain way. I just think old friends are really, really important.

- Jonathan Levine

I grew up with Woody Allen and early Spike Lee movies in which New York was such a specific character. The city has a certain vibe and beat which really informs your entire existence.

- Jonathan Levine

In rehearsals, I like to create an honest environment that is kinda free and fun.

- Jonathan Levine

I used to obsess on critical reactions to my films, and it's really not a healthy way to live your life, so my new take on it is simply, 'I hope people like it!' I'm not going to be looking at the tomato meter for at least a year! I was very lucky on '50/50' that most critics really liked it.

- Jonathan Levine

For whatever reason, the films I gravitate towards do have these strange sort of tonal balances to them... I kind of realized on '50/ 50' why I liked these blending of tones, because I think it's kind of what life is like: funny one minute, sad the next, scary the next.

- Jonathan Levine

On '50/50,' even though it was 8 million dollars, it was all acting-intensive.

- Jonathan Levine

I like to branch out as much as I can, but I feel like the movies that are closest to my heart are 'The Wackness' and '50/50' - the ones that are dramedies that have that human element to them.

- Jonathan Levine

I have a cameo in every movie. In '50/50,' I'm in the back of the bus.

- Jonathan Levine

I love Jamaica so much. I've been there so much, and I think it would be great if we could shoot a movie there.

- Jonathan Levine

I really like it when movies take a song and use it to counterpoint a scene.

- Jonathan Levine

Genre is a really great shorthand you can have with an audience. In the same way you can use music to create a connection with an audience, it brings so much of their knowledge of what genre really is to the table. You have a shortcut to connect with them. I really like that.

- Jonathan Levine

To me, using music is creating a shorthand with an audience. And I love music so much.

- Jonathan Levine

Any time I hear certain songs I put in a movie, I have to not listen to them anymore because I associate them with that movie. They take on that association rather than the association I had when I first heard them. So it's kinda bittersweet to put a song in a movie, honestly.

- Jonathan Levine

I kind of viewed '50/ 50' and 'Warm Bodies' both as my next films after 'The Wackness.' In my head, I was just like, 'I'll try the big, fun, adventure-weird movie, and I'll do the small, heartfelt comedy-drama, and one of them will probably work out, and I'll get to work more.'

- Jonathan Levine

I've had a couple of family members deal with cancer, and I remember that moment where they're going into surgery, and you just have no idea what's going to happen, and it's really scary.

- Jonathan Levine

'Warm Bodies' - I was contractually obligated to deliver a PG-13 movie. But, like, I wanted it to be PG-13 because it's for younger people, and I don't want them not to be able to see it. I mean, you have to kind of think about the marketplace as well.

- Jonathan Levine

I'm a writer and director. And the movie I've seen a million times is 'Coming Home,' directed by Hal Ashby and starring Jon Voight, Jane Fonda and Bruce Dern.

- Jonathan Levine

I've been a huge fan of Hal Ashby forever. And I think that the distinctive thing about 'Coming Home' is the love story, and how - kind of emotionally real it is, and how these two characters allow each other to see their - kind of vulnerabilities. And it's great because it's a love story that's not really that cheesy, either.

- Jonathan Levine

The way 'Coming Home' uses music in general is incredible, but the final song that really kind of crescendos all of the emotion that the whole movie has kind of been building to is this song called 'Once I Was' by Tim Buckley.

- Jonathan Levine

Right after 'The Wackness' came out, it was a really exciting time, and then it was a bit disappointing when it came out. Even though not that many people saw it, I was still getting offered some movies. I was thinking that people would just stop calling me since it didn't do very well at the box office.

- Jonathan Levine

I really don't like when you see improv scenes go on too long. It really bothers me, even if the jokes are good.

- Jonathan Levine

I think Giuliani started a trend that Bloomberg continued with rampant gentrification, and I think it's tough because why would any city choose not to do that?

- Jonathan Levine

I learned some big lessons on my first film, a horror film which was never released in the U.S., even though we sold it to Harvey Weinstein for a lot of money.

- Jonathan Levine

There's so often - in filmmaking, you're backed into something that already has these set parameters, whether it's a sequel or a book that people love.

- Jonathan Levine

I definitely think for up and coming filmmakers, people graduating from film school, people that want to do their own movies, horror movies are a great way to go.

- Jonathan Levine

I was Paul Schrader's assistant for six months before I went to film school, and he's very much about knowing what's going to happen on every page before you even start writing dialogue - the entire plot and character arcs are mapped out.

- Jonathan Levine

If you know how to shoot a scene, then you know how to shoot an action scene. If you've seen an action movie, and you watched it, and you paid attention to how scenes are constructed and where the camera is and how the camera moves, then you know how to do it.

- Jonathan Levine

I think that's the great thing about zombies, is, you know, going back to even 'Night of the Living Dead,' they've always been a tool for kind of holding up a mirror to us and showing us something about ourselves that we might not otherwise know.

- Jonathan Levine

I think I'm always conscious of not letting things fit into a specific box. Being a filmmaker and trying to chart a career, you never want anyone to be able to pigeonhole you into one specific thing.

- Jonathan Levine

As I continue to evolve as a filmmaker, I'm going to continue to do different stuff.

- Jonathan Levine

I think it's cyclical. Zombies have been around for ages, and vampires have run their course; we've had so many vampire movies.

- Jonathan Levine

After 'Mandy Lane,' I didn't really know what to do because I didn't know anyone who'd made a feature yet.

- Jonathan Levine

I love subverting expectations or playing with the sort of unspoken kind of connections that the audience has.

- Jonathan Levine

I like a pretty relaxed, fun set. Everyone knows they can bring whoever they want and hang out.

- Jonathan Levine

My first real television-watching experience was when I watched 'L.A. Law,' like, at 10 o'clock Thursday nights with my parents. They would let me stay up late.

- Jonathan Levine

Usually, the kills are almost Wile E. Coyote kind of things in horror movies.

- Jonathan Levine

I was actually shooting 'Warm Bodies' on the day that '50/50' came out, which I don't recommend to other filmmakers because I was sort of a wreck. Actually, it was good for me, because I had work to do, so I couldn't obsess all day and be checking how '50/50' was doing!

- Jonathan Levine

'Purple Rain' is probably the best soundtrack.

- Jonathan Levine

'Warm Bodies' was a more long-term thing; I had to write the script, who knew if it was every really going to happen, if I'd find the right actors, and so on, so I grabbed '50/50' because I just fell in love with it.

- Jonathan Levine

I watched 'Return Of The Living Dead.' That one's cool, man. I like that one.

- Jonathan Levine

For me, I just value my friendships so much. I mean, I love my family, too, but my friends - I have a really special connection with my friends.

- Jonathan Levine

It's rare that movies can sort of capture the tone of life; movies always feel like they have to be one thing or another.

- Jonathan Levine

I used to drive a convertible around L.A. a lot.

- Jonathan Levine

That's the great thing about being a director. You have your list of things you have to worry about and things you don't have to worry about. If you can hire someone or cast someone who equates to not having to worry about, it's great!

- Jonathan Levine

I like zombie movies, and I like genre movies a lot. To watch. Less so to make, I think. But I grew up on that stuff. I would just grow up watching a lot of horror movies, a lot of slasher movies and then zombie movies.

- Jonathan Levine

To be a director, you have to think you're the best. Ever since I went to film school, I imagined that you have to think deep down that you want to be Martin Scorsese or you want to be P.T. Anderson. Like, am I as good as those guys? Absolutely not. I feel like I keep learning, and I feel like I keep getting better.

- Jonathan Levine

I definitely think New York is a very, very vibrant, wonderful city, but I certainly, of course, can't help but miss a lot of the stuff that's no longer there.

- Jonathan Levine

For me, the best high school movie is, like, 'Fast Times' and what Cameron Crowe is like.

- Jonathan Levine

I really hope everyone who saw 'Twilight' sees 'Warm Bodies,' but at the same time... I don't resent the comparison on a level of quality because I don't judge other movies like that. Now that I make movies, I see how hard it is to do everything. I pretty much love all movies.

- Jonathan Levine

I just think a lot of movies are too long. I want to know how to make my movie as tight as possible.

- Jonathan Levine

I have about 100 gigs of music, and I'm always going through thinking about what song I can match to a scene and all that.

- Jonathan Levine

Do I wish I was Martin Scorsese? Yeah. But am I really proud of the movies I've made and really happy that I get to keep making them? Yes.

- Jonathan Levine

As a director, there's no natural career progression. So after 'The Wackness,' which was very personal to me, I was very, very picky about what I was going to do next, to the point where I think that I was almost too picky.

- Jonathan Levine

I was intimidated by Malkovich for, like, a couple of days, and then I wasn't. He's awesome. He's so cool. He was so wonderful to work with.

- Jonathan Levine

I always look at myself as kind of a work in progress. I hope that's not always the case. But for me, every film is a learning experience.

- Jonathan Levine

For me, it's always more interesting to look at things when you don't really have a horse in the race, so to speak.

- Jonathan Levine

I have a lot of friends with bad taste in music - some might say that I have bad taste in music.

- Jonathan Levine

As a director, your expectation and reality don't always match up, and I think that that's... I think it's a little jarring.

- Jonathan Levine

I don't often watch something I've done on TV. Usually, I'll change the channel and watch something else.

- Jonathan Levine